


Crazier than a Bag of Wet Cats

by Sealachii



Category: Dangan Ronpa
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-09-02
Packaged: 2017-12-23 21:17:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/931193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sealachii/pseuds/Sealachii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A short drabble series exploring the different kinds of crazy that comes with combining Hinata and Komaeda. </p>
<p>"At first, being with Komaeda is like holding a ticking time bomb."</p>
<p>WARNING: Pretty ooc, works on the promise that komaeda is actually quite a bit off.<br/>I would take this down but some people like it sooooo.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Time Bomb

At first, being with Komaeda is like holding a ticking time bomb.  
Touching him is like disassembling a trigger, he must go carefully and slowly and precisely, lest he scares him away and has the whole thing blow up in his face. Hugging him is like clasping a pack of c-4 to your chest, and he can hear the tick of his metaphorical timer, a gross parody of a human heartbeat. Kissing him is like holding the grenade pin between your teeth; Hinata likes to imagine that it’s the same kind of sick anticipation, the same thrill, the same danger. 

_Because Komaeda, for all his talks of hope, has always been a very real source of despair._

This is a boy that he cannot control cannot predict cannot _trust_. And it’s insanity; because it has to be. To step willingly into the minefield that is Komaeda Nagito again and again. Out of what? Some sort of sick fascination, a reluctant addiction, a frightening sort of dependence they seem to have developed for each other?

_After all who could begrudge them a bad habit, when every day could be their last?_

This _thing_ that grew between them (between the cracks and crevices of Hinata’s distrust, Komaeda’s insanity) has taken root at a frightening pace, and despite all of their attempts to remove it, it seems that it is here to stay.  
Growing like a particularly vicious weed it winds tighter and tighter around both until for better or for worse, Hinata can’t ever imagine giving it up. Giving _him_ up.

At that point being with Komaeda is like standing in the eye of the storm: A small pocket of peace and stillness and quiet, from where you can see chaos raging on around you.  
The perfect vantage point to see the sum of his parts, all of what makes him such a beautiful disaster

He rages on like a hurricane, but Hinata’s long figured out how to soothe his frayed edges and restore the calm.  
Just as Komaeda knows how to side step his sore spots, how to deal with his moods.

All the while _the thing_ wound around them both grows even more; into something softer, but not as fragile. And Hinata can’t help but enjoy it, to the point that he can crave it without qualms.

_Because somehow along the way he learned how to trust him._

It’s not something perfect, sugar-sweet and beautiful. It is, as a matter of fact a complete mess. It is a clash of ideals and personalities that overflowed into tension, into the particular kind of spark that results in a very odd kind of sloppy make outs; where he’d give his life to keep Komaeda safe but also wouldn’t hesitate to punch him right in the face.

It’s certainly not an ideal kind of relationship. But since when has anything concerning him been regular?  
This is something that began with the tick of a time bomb (intensity and anxiety and fear) but has regulated into the beat of a metronome. (Soothing and steady and the one thing keeping you sane)


	2. Kisses

Nothing with Komaeda is ever standard. Not even the kissing.  
Because Hinata’s fairly sure kissing isn’t supposed to feel like this. This dizzying, all slickness and intensity that leaves you hazy.  Where you could swear that with each press of your lips he’sbreathing out a slice of his crazy into your mouth. And he can feel it slipping into him, little puffs of insanity that cloud his mind and make everything hazy. Until his brain feels like cotton and he’s lost in the sensation of something soft and warm (warm and warm and warmer until it feels like you swallowed hot coals). 

Kissing Komaeda is like being set ablaze from the inside out, only you’re enjoying every second of it.

Hinata doesn’t know how to explain it. How could he, without sounding insane, say that it’s almost as if the very air Komaeda exhales feels different. Heavy with something he can’t quite _name_ but that he can _taste_ (heady and bitter like some kind of toxic fume) _._ He feels stupid just thinking about it, but he can’t quite stop.

Because it happens every time they find themselves alone. Neither of them knows how or why but it can go on for what feels like ages, and every time their breath mingles in the space between them it feels like it’s charged with a special kind of electricity that spurs them on to keep at it again and again and again.

This has gone on long enough, often enough that there’s a pattern to it, to these preciously wasted hours. One way or another one of them caves and first and they end up as they always do, breathing in each other’s toxins; disheveled and panting, drunk on sleepy eyed contentment.

Today is one of those days. They’re at Hinata’s cabin, both of them rumpled and breathy by the time Komaeda pulls away with a mumbled “I should go.” But apparently he’s breathed in a bit too much of Komaeda’s crazy this time because – in an impulse – he grabs onto the other boy’s arm and the words “no - stay,” tumble out unbidden.

Komaeda’s eyes are a bit wide; he can see the surprise flit through his expression quicker than a blinking. But he mumbles out an “ok” faster than Hinata’s brain can process what he just said and before he knows what’s happening he has 67 Kilograms of “super high school level crazy bastard” pressed up against him, and they’re back to square one.

\-------

It’s already way too dark by the time they notice what time it is and by then ‘stay’ has turned into ‘stay over tonight’. So they just lie in the dark staring at each other and Hinata can’t help but break the quiet and whisper, “God you’re like crack.”

Komaeda frowns as soon as he hears him, scrunching up his nose, a perfect picture of confusion. “What?”  
  
“I feel like every time I kiss you I’m catching a bit of your crazy,” the words tumble out before he can stop the once more, but this time Komaeda’s eyes are bright and excited.  
“Oh so you feel it too?” He says, mouth curling up at the corners in a wicked grin.

Hinata’s head spins, this time it’s his turn to be confused. “Wait what?”

“I thought it was just me,” Komaeda whispers. “But you feel it too. Don’t you?”  
“It’s like you’re breathing hope into me, I can feel it. I can feel it slide down my throat and settle in my lungs. Heavy and perfect like liquid gold,” he rambles on with that crazy look coming into his eye, gesturing wildly.

“I like it because it was _your_ air it was _your_ hope and now it’s mine. And it spreads all over my body to each and every cell. As long as we’re kissing everything in me breathes in a little piece of you. Every atom of my miserable being gets a bit of you hope,” he culminates his little speech by smiling wide and brilliant and happy, its blinding and beautiful and way too good looking to be the same mouth that just spewed out all that crazy a few seconds ago. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hinta im pretty sure you cant inhale someone's crazy via breath and/or bodily fluids so i think you're bound to be a little off your rocker also; not exactly the best to position to go around pointing fingers.


	3. Happiness hits you like a bullet in the head

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is one is really shitty gomen forever.

Sometimes Komaeda says beautiful things.  
Soft, lovely, poetical things that throw Hinata for a loop because he didn’t know Komaeda could talk like that. Sometimes he speaks and his words lasso the moon and the stars and bring them down to eye level. (Beautiful shining things that he hand picks from the skies above)

Tiny universes spill out from in between his lips - stories about good and evil and triumph; poems about the loved and the lovely and the world all around them. He whispers them into Hinata’s ear like a precious secret and in those moments he can’t comprehend why Komaeda thinks himself talentless.

Other times he spews out incoherencies so fast he trips over the words, babbling about hope and death and mutual killing. Sharp, twisted things about pain and sacrifice that remind of him of what a colossal disaster this boy is. Those days whatever tumbles out of his mouth has the consistency of razor blades and broken glass and instead of whispering them, Komaeda yells them out for the whole world to hear.

But sometimes he combines both. The result is twisted beautiful things that worm their way into Hinata’s brain and keep him awake at night while he mulls them over. Crazy things that make too much sense, which Komaeda mentions casually, as if he was talking about the weather.  
 On those days he’s always over the moon. His eyes are always fever bright and he’s always laughing, cackling, high and breathy. He smiles a Mona Lisa smile like he knows the secrets of the universe; and Hinata never knows how to deal with Komaeda in those days.

\--------------------

This time he’s just lounging around on his room, when Komaeda barges in without knocking, looking manic.  
Hinata can tell just by looking that today is one of _those days_ where he can’t contain the words buzzing around inside of him and they spill out in a jumbled mess. Fucked up, lovely sounding things that suit him more than they should.

“Have you ever let happiness hit you all at once?” He asks, rambling on in panting breaths, like he ran all the way here. . “Like a bullet in the head, fast and explosive, blacking out everything?”

And Hinata doesn’t quite know what the hell you say to that, so the first thing that comes out of his mouth is a very confused, very heartfelt “Uhh, No?”

“Oh,” and Komaeda wilts just a little bit at the words. Shoulders slumping as he fiddles with the edge of his coat.  
“Because I realized that’s how it feels. Happy. The kind of happy that feels like you’re gonna die from it because it’s too much and it’s all at once, absolute and instantaneous.”

A thrill goes through Hinata when he hears those words. It’s not of the good kind; it leaves an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach and raises all the metaphorical red flags. Because he’s developed a sixth sense towards what are acceptable levels of crazy in Komaeda and while this kind of talk is new, it does not mean it falls into the acceptable category. So with a sigh he decides to just go along with the usual process by now and try to understand what the hell the other boy is talking about now.

“How what feels?” He asks warily, because he’s already learned that he needs to be on his guard when Komaeda gets like this.

And the first sign that something is off is the fact that Komaeda doesn’t answer instantaneously, but instead keeps fiddling with the coat and looking down, mumbling something too quiet to hear.

“What?”  
“I said it’s you,” Komaeda mumbles once again, but this time he manages to catch it.  
Hinata’s suspicions are then confirmed. Because this is definitely not a good thing; but when he looks at how Komaeda is standing, still hunched, looking wary, he can’t bring himself to say ‘ _no that’s fucked up. And bad and it goes on the list of things you should probably never say to people’_.

“Well that’s kind of…”and the words trail off into the air, since Hinata has no idea at all of how to finish that sentence. He has no idea what to do or what to say or what to think and the room descends into heavy silence.  
  
“Bad?” Komaeda finishes for him; all his previous energy gone. 

“Well…no. Just, umm,” Hinata stammers, “Can you…explain?”

“Yes!” And suddenly he’s back in high spirits as he grasps Hinata’s wrist in a surprisingly steely grip and rushes them out of the cabin and though the island until they arrives stumbling at the beach; kicking up sand everywhere as Komaeda more or less physically drags him into the sea despite his protests. Going deeper and deeper until the water is up to their chests. And only then Komaeda lets go of his hand, when they’re standing in the water fully clothed while small waves wash over them and soak anything above water level, leaving them both dripping wet.

“Do you trust me?” He asks, with one of his genuine smiles (because Komaeda’s a manipulative bastard who knows exactly what weaknesses to exploit).

“If I didn’t I don’t think I’d let you drag me out of my room and into the ocean” Hinata says drily.

“Ok then, I’m going to explain, but you have to trust me. And stay completely still.”

As soon as Hinata gives a small nod, Komaeda grabs him without warning and dunks him underwater, taking care to cover both his nose and his mouth, but holding him firmly underneath the surface. Like a baptism into insanity.

And in that moment Hinata realizes that they’re crazy, they both are because despite his surprise he doesn’t fight back. To what would seem for all the world like some sort of poorly thought out assassination attempt. Just lets Komaeda hold him still so he doesn’t float upwards and tries to think of anything but the building sense of pressure in his lungs. Decides to count to 30 and see if he doesn’t pull him up then (and if he doesn’t then Hinata decides to fuck the whole trust thing because _there’s a limit to this kind of crazy bullshit_ )

But just before he starts to get desperate for air, he pulls him up. And he comes up with a gasp, sputtering for air, splashing water all over the place. Komaeda crowds around him, eyes bright once more, “did you feel it?”

“Feel what?” Hinata croaks, privately contemplating why the hell he puts up with this.

“The way that first breath feels, desperate and wonderful and you know that without it you would have died, or gone crazy. Do you get it now? That’s what it feels like. Like dying and coming back to life. That’s what you feel like to me.”

The dread in Hinata’s stomach intensifies, when faced with these words. But as he chokes in a few more lungful’s of salty air he figures that since they’re both clearly wrong in the head it might work out between them after all. 


	4. Good Days, Bad Days, Odd Days

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im fairly sure these decrease in quality as time goes on. sobs. bUT I WILL DO MY BEST TO MAKE IT UP TO YOU GUYS NEXT TIME AROUND OR ELSE.

There are days were Komaeda’s almost alright.  
As alright as it’s possible for him to be. Days where they both manage to balance everything on the head of a pin; precarious and temporary but, even for a few fleeting moments, perfect. Since on those days he knows to keep a lid on the hope bit, and there’s not a single mention of murder or killing or sacrifice. There are days where he’s just a brilliant, insightful boy with messed up hair and a wheezy laugh. One who smiles at him softly and kisses him softer until it feels like they’re both walking on clouds.

But just as there are good days, there are bad days, where he goes off the deep end in multiple ways; like a car with no brakes, slipping and sliding the whole way down; a literal freak accident that you can’t look away from. Because when Komaeda goes off the rails it’s more like he tears up the whole track and drags everyone down with him.  A few words from him can break the quiet and throw them all into chaos, while he sits at the center of the madness and smiles happily; looking proud at the pandemonium he’s caused.

There are times when he looks up and their eyes connect and it’s like seeing a whole different person. Because the look he gives is cold and calculating, lit by this unholy glint of something dark and dangerous. And though he hates admitting it, on those days Hinata gets scared. Because this Komaeda feels different from the one he knows. Someone warped and twisted by his quest for hope until he feels more alien than ever; completely removed from reality as he is.

In true Komaeda fashion, there are so many layers to his moods and mentalities that Hinata is as close to understanding it as close as he is to understanding the boy himself. (Which is to say, not at all). So he learns how to go with the flow, the push and the pull of the good days, the bad days and the odd days until they strike a shaky equilibrium once more.  

\------------------

Sunsets on the island are a beautiful thing. Red and gold and purple, like the whole horizon is catching fire, ready to melt down this shit speck of land and all the mutual killing going on there. But Hinata isn’t quite free to appreciate it today. Instead he’s prowling around the cabins, on the lookout for someone. The reason?  

It’s already sundown and Hinata hasn’t seen Komaeda all day today.  
Sometimes this isn’t a bad thing, him leaving them all alone, and these count as good days by default.  
But sometimes it is, because Komaeda alone means it’s an opportunity for all his thoughts to fester and grow into new bursts of insanity. Little ideas, that bubble into spoken words, that spill over into actions. And those are usually anything but good.

Just as Hinata starts to get frustrated, Komaeda appears suddenly, in his usual fashion. Almost as if he materialized out of thin air. And before Hinata can stammer out an indignant ‘where in the fuck have you been?’ Komaeda reaches out and grabs fistfuls of his shirt. Stumbling into his personal space, until they’re nose to nose, eye to eye and he can see the others’ are bloodshot, red rimmed and watery, as if he’d been crying.

“Make it stop,” Komaeda hisses with a shaky voice; taking heaving, shuddery breaths and burying his fingers tighter into Hinata’s shirt.  
“What the hell!” He hisses back, fruitlessly attempting to pry Komaeda’s hands off of him.  
“Make what stop? Let go of me!”

Komaeda doesn’t respond. But his breaths become sharper, shallower as he leans into Hinata more and more until he’s completely slumped on him. This is the moment Hinata realizes something is definitely, desperately wrong, as his annoyance evaporates in the blink of an eye.  
“Hey, just breathe alright?”

“Ko-Komaeda?” He stammers out, but the other boy doesn’t seem to hear him. He’s outright panting now, gasping for air; and a thrill of fear washes over Hinata, curls low in his stomach and leaves an acrid taste in his mouth.  
“Nagito?”

“Please make it stop.” He mutters into the crook of Hinata’s neck, boneless and _heavy_ , dangerously close to throwing him off balance. Hinata frantically does his best to shift their combined weight and after a few minutes of shuffling and swaying manages to balance them out; ending up with his arms wrapped around Komaeda’s middle, holding up his dead weight.

They stay in this strange embrace for a beat of silence (broken only by the rasp of Komaeda’s breathing, which is thankfully regulating), until Hinata’s concern wins over his confusion and he realizes that even though he may not know what is going on he has to do _something_.  
“Come on, let’s get you to your cabin.” He says, attempting to right Komaeda and get him to stand on his own once more.  
“Hey come on,” he mutters with a sigh. But Komaeda stays slumped and unresponsive. So with a few grumbled complaints he shifts and shuffles them once more until he manages to fold up Komaeda’s gangly limbs enough to carry him.

This is how they make the whole trek to Komaeda’s cabin. Hinata awkwardly juggling the extra weight while Komaeda holds onto his shirt like a lifeline and puffs out hot, damp breaths against his collarbone. By the time he manages to reach the cabin and preform some delicate maneuvers to open the door Komaeda looks calmer. And once he’s rearranged them both on the bed he looks more or less back to normal.

“So,” Hinata starts, after a few moments of them lying on the bed in the dark, just staring at each other. “What the fuck was that?”

Komaeda huffs out a breath and fists a hand in the rumpled sheets. He looks at Hinata up through his lashes, biting his lip; everything about him screams uncertainty and fragility and it’s clear that whatever happened isn’t over yet. Because despite how demure he’s acting he can see that glint in his eye, even in the half light. That fever bright shine they get whenever he’s about to do something crazy.

“There’s a buzzing,” Komaeda whispers, slowly and conspiratorially. “There’s a buzzing in my head and under my skin.  But you make it stop.”  

“It’s awful,” he hisses, reaching out for Hinata and digging his fingernails into other boy’s arm. “There’s white noise in my head 24/7. It’s a scratchy, whining sound like a broken down radio and it’s been there for so long I don’t know what it’s like to hear silence anymore.”

“Sometimes it gets so loud, too loud, like right now.” Komaeda says, winding his free hand into his hair and tugging it hard enough Hinata’s surprised he hasn’t ripped out a chunk already. Because he looks so tightly wound he seems to sing like a taut string and Hinata knows that this is one of those moments that he has to tread carefully. Because this boy’s just like a bubble, one wrong move one wrong touch and he’s gone. Burst into pieces split at the seams. So he takes a shaky breath and begins untangling Komaeda’s hand from where he’s tangled it into his hair; pries Komaeda’s fingers off his arm, off the place where he grasped tightly enough for his nails to leave little half-moon crescents on the skin. Takes the same hand and (in an impulse) brushes his lips over the knuckles and threads their fingers together. Komaeda makes a small strangled sound, screws his eyes shut and grabs onto Hinata’s hand like his life depends on their clasped hands.

“What do you mean that I make it stop?” Hinata asks hesitantly.

  “Just that,” Komaeda says, and though his voice is steady his hands are shaking. “Sometimes it feels like it’s gonna drive me crazy. And the only thing I want is for it to stop. It feels like bugs crawling under your skin and rattling around you brain until you can’t even think. This is something that’s happened since forever and I’m already used to it. But you make it stop. When touch me, the things crawling under my skin stop and the buzzing goes away.”

“Are they gone now?”

“Almost.”

Hinata shifts closer until they’re nose to nose once again and he can rest his forehead against the others’. “How long ‘till they go away?”

“Not long.”

Hinata mutters a quiet ‘ok’ and closes his eyes, not having it in him to make a big deal out of this for the moment. Komaeda’s always been odd (far too odd for his own good) and this just happens to be one more thing on his list of peculiarities. There’s no reason to get up in arms about it, particularly when this happens to be one of his tamer ones.

For now they are both content to lie there in the silence, and let the in and out of each other’s breathing lull them to sleep. Later they will wake up and discuss what happened and how it happened and why it happened. But for now they just rest in a tangle of limbs and let their breath fan across the space between them, enjoying the quiet. 


End file.
